to win the love she valued? And now the nature so impulsive
and ingenuous was impelled by the instinct of woman's pride to assume
the mantle of concealment, to learn its task of suffering and silence.
She could not, without betraying her true feelings, seem depressed,
when all about her was happier than ever, and not a shadow rested on
the hearts around her. Her mother was constitutionally tranquil; and
Amy, in the relying gladness of her early youth, saw nothing to fear,
and all things to hope. It was a trying effort for Theresa to bury the
conflict of her impetuous emotions in the stillness of her own
bosom--the more trying because she had never before known cause for
reserve; but the power of endurance in womanhood is mighty, and she
did conceal even from my watchful eyes, the triumph of certainty over
hope. I knew not then that the silver chord was already severed, and
the veil lifted from the pale face of grief, never again in mercy to
lend its secrecy.

The extreme youth of Amy alone delayed her marriage, and the following
year was appointed as the time of its celebration. In the meanwhile
the lovers would meet almost daily, and there seemed nothing but
happiness before them. And she, the highly endowed, the richly gifted,
what was to be her lot? Even now the mists were gathering around her;
her faith in the hereafter was lessened; disappointment haunted her
onward steps, and memory darkened to regret. Poor Theresa! there was
many a pang in her experience then proudly hidden from all human gaze;
and her suffering was not the less because she felt that it arose in
part from self-deception, and from its very character was beyond the
solace of sympathy.

A few evenings afterward, I was sitting alone, when, with her light
and eager step, Theresa entered my little study at the parsonage. Her
cheek was flushed by her rapid walk, and her eyes sparkled as she laid
before me a letter she had just received. I did not then comprehend
the eagerness with which she grasped the refuge of excitement and
change, but my heart sunk within me as I read the lines before me, for
too well I foresaw the endless links of perplexity and misconstruction
which would drag themselves, a dreary chain through the years to come.
The letter was from the painter with whom she had studied his art, and
was written with the kind feeling of one who, from the memory of his
own aspirations, could sympathize with hers. He reminded her of a wish
she had